


100 Ways

by reysrose



Series: Fire and Grave Dirt [1]
Category: The 100
Genre: Babies, Friends to Lovers, Grief, Indra is a proud mama bear and Kane is just hoping nobody dies, Mental Illness, Multi, Niylah has her shit together, Post Season Four, Reunions, selective canon compliance, the bunker struggle is very real, time skip
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-07-17
Updated: 2018-08-22
Packaged: 2018-12-03 13:23:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 16
Words: 9,998
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11533116
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/reysrose/pseuds/reysrose
Summary: How Octavia and Niylah fall in love, featuring the Space Gang, radio shenanigans, and people having babies.





	1. Everything is gonna be ok

**Author's Note:**

> I posted this, wasn't happy with it, revamped it, and decided to repost. Please leave me kudos or comments and hit me up on skai--ripa on Tumblr. I'm a hoe for validation.

The second the earth above them stops shaking, Octavia stumbles into her office and collapses against the door. There are tears streaming down her face unbidden, and she buries her face in her knees. Her head is throbbing and she can’t remember the last time she ate or drank anything. She whimpers and chokes on her next sob. 

There’s something warm oozing down her abdomen and she vaguely remembers Luna cutting across her stomach before the black rain started. Her arm is bleeding again too, soaking through the third bandage Indra slapped on before they culled Skaikru. Nausea rises up in her stomach and she barely manages to scramble off the floor to the wastebasket next to the massive oak desk. 

There’s not even enough in her stomach to be worth a single heave, let alone the five she forces out before she curls in on herself on the tile floor. Her entire body throbs in time to her heartbeat. 

There’s a knock on the door to the office and a soft voice calling her name. She recognizes the lilt as Niylah, but when she tries to call out, all that comes out is a raspy, strangled groan.

“Okteivia? Are you alright?” 

Octavia whimpers. Another wave of nausea washes over her and she retches again, staying curled in the ball on the floor. Her mouth fills with stomach acid that burns on the way up, and she clamps it shut, hoping she’ll be able to swallow it back down. Her gag reflex doesn’t care that she doesn’t want to throw up, and she heaves again, and the stuff in her mouth comes out her nose and soaks into her ponytail. Another knock. She tries to drag herself into a sitting position and collapses back down at the pain radiating from her bloody stomach to the rest of her body with a short, sharp cry. The door opens. 

“Oh, Okteivia.” 

Niylah’s face swims into her line of vision, pale and concerned, and Octavia curls on her side to face the other woman with a low whine. The place where the man from Skaikru struck her is angry and bruised, and it fills Octavia with anger. She reaches up to touch it and her hand shakes. All of her is shaking, she realizes with a feeling of detachment. She looks at Niylah slowly, her eyelashes obscuring part of her vision.

“Cold.”

“I bet. You’re burning up. I don’t understand why nobody thought to check you over.”

“Indra did.”

“I mean an actual doctor, Okteivia. Abby.”  
“She was a little busy being unconscious.” 

Niylah snorts. 

“Very well. I’m going to move you now. Stay awake, alright? Focus on that.” 

Hands roll her on her back and she blinks to bring Niylah back into focus. 

“You’re pretty,” she coos, voice warbling. Niylah smiles softly down at her, her hand tracing Octavia’s cheek. 

“And you’re delirious. Do you think you can stand?”

She nods weakly, even though she probably cannot, and then Niylah starts to lift her to sitting. Her head spins and her vision darkens and she cries out weakly. 

“Easy, easy. Everything is gonna be ok.” 

Niylah practically carries her to medical, and Octavia lets her head lull onto the other woman’s shoulder. 

Abby sighs when she sees Octavia, and gestures to an empty bed. 

“I’ll be right with you. Niylah, can you clean her up a little and start an IV?” 

Niylah must say something to the affirmative because Octavia feels something cold wiping across the back of her hand and then a sharp prick. And another. And another. She whines. 

“Abby? I can’t find a good vein.” 

Her arm is pulled straight. More pricks, one after the other, until her fevered brain can’t handle it anymore and she begins to cry. 

“Almost there, honey.”

Two more, and then something cold flows into her veins. O grins dopily. 

“What’s so funny?”

“It tickles.” 

Chuckling, Niylah smooths a wet cloth over her face, taking off the makeup around her eyes and the vomit on her chin. 

“Seems like I’m always patching you up lately, huh?”

Octavia hums. 

Gradually, as Niylah mops blood off of her body, the pain begins to ebb, and somewhere between Niylah wiping sick out of her hair and Abby coming over to cut the dirty bandage off her arm, Octavia falls asleep. 

When she wakes up, she’s clean and bandaged and there’s a warm hand brushing her hair out of her face. She feels like she’s in a cocoon, just her and that warm hand and soft voice singing to her gently, and for the first time since Lincoln died she feels safe. 

“Niylah?”

“Yes, love?”

“Thank you.” 

Niylah’s face is like the sun, and O feels warm for the first time in months.


	2. I'm Here if you Need to Talk

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Leave a comment or some kudos!

Once Octavia is released from Medical, Niylah stops sleeping. It’s harder without Octavia in the bed nearest her cot. She’s been pulling double and triple shifts since they got in the bunker, and she’s not even entirely sure when she started a medical internship but she’s been running around treating radiation burns and claustrophobia for almost a week with no break, and now, without Octavia within arm’s reach, she can’t even sleep when she does get a chance to lay down. 

She’s lost so many people. Her father, her mother, her younger brother, everyone she’s loved over the years. She can’t lose Octavia. She can’t. And maybe it’s stupid, and almost definitely unrequited, but she can’t help falling in love with the girl a little bit. Ever since she left that lantern at the trading post, the only person in that nightmare to thank her, to even acknowledge her for longer than nine seconds, Niylah’s had a soft spot for her, one which is only getting worse as she spends more time around Octavia. 

So she stops sleeping, and starts wandering. Most of the time she ends up walking back and forth down the hall where Octavia and the ambassadors sleep, pacing in front of Octavia’s door because she’s too anxious to stop doing it. It’s not like she’s going to vanish in the night, and the first thing the other girl does is stop by medical every morning to check in, but whenever Niylah tries to let it go, she sees Octavia, not breathing on a metal table, barely conscious through a haze of smoke, curled on the floor of her office covered in her own sick and burning with fever, and she heads right back to the hallway. 

It’s the third day she’s spent pacing outside Octavia’s door when she hears the screams. 

They’re heartbreaking sounds, short, sharp bursts of abject fear that cut Niylah right to the bone. She’s in the room before she can even think that maybe, just maybe, bursting into the room of the commander while she’s in the middle of a nightmare is the opposite of a good idea.

Octavia is screaming and thrashing in the middle of the bed, tangled in the sheets and whitefaced. Niylah makes a mental note to check her still healing abdomen once she wakes, worried that the movement is going to tear the stitches. Doors slam open in the hallway, but she ignores them and crawls onto the bed, grabbing Octavia’s face in her hands.

“Okteivia. Okteivia. It’s just a dream, strik gona.” 

Octavia screeches, and then Niylah is on her back, Octavia’s hands around her throat. 

“NO! NO!”

Octavia’s hands tighten around her neck, and the part of Niylah that isn’t focused on the fact that she’s suffocating wants to know what Octavia is seeing and who she thinks she’s choking to death. There’s other people in the room, dragging Octavia off of her, sitting her up, holding her head and making her drink water from a straw, and then suddenly it’s all over, and Octavia is huddled in the corner of the room, face buried in Kane’s chest and shaking. Indra, who Niylah realizes too late is the one who dragged Octavia off her, is leaning against the wall, her face stony, and Niylah walks over to her, careful not to disturb Octavia, who’s letting out tiny whimpers.

“This has been happening since they released her. She wakes half the hallway with her screams and then it takes us hours to calm her. She refuses to talk about them, and they’re getting worse with time. I’m worried she’ll soon break from the stress. ” 

“Do you think she’d let me near her? Maybe I could help.” 

Indra shrugs, dropping a hand on Niylah’s shoulder and squeezing.

“It’s worth the try.” 

She walks over quietly, not wanting to startle the girl, and crouches next to Kane, reaching for Octavia’s hand. She shudders when Niylah touches her, but doesn’t pull away. Octavia’s hand is cold and clammy in hers, and when Niylah shifts into a more comfortable position Octavia lets out a strangled sound and her grip tightens. 

“I’m not going anywhere. I’m right here. I promise” 

She must sit there on the floor next to Kane for almost an hour before Octavia uncurls herself from him and immediately pushes her face into Niylah’s chest with a whimper. Kane helps her get Octavia off the floor and back to the bed, and then he and Indra leave, Indra pressing a soft kiss to Octavia’s sweaty forehead and giving Niylah a gentle pat on the back. 

Niylah swings her legs onto the bed and leans against the headboard. Octavia is refusing to look at her, just laying there, limp and shaking. 

“Okteivia..”

“I-I’m fine.” 

“Sweet one, I’m here if you need to talk.”

“C-can you just hold me?”

“Of course.”

Octavia doesn’t close her eyes or make a sound , just lays there and lets Niylah wrap her up in her arms and cover them both in the blankets on the bed. The sobs start gradually, and then grow increasingly more dramatic until the girl turns to face her and presses their foreheads together. 

“I-I was under the floor. And it was dark, and it was cold, and I couldn’t see and I was suffocating and Niylah-”

 

“Shhh. Shhhhhhh. Breathe. Breathe with me.”

“I can’t. Niylah I can’t.”

“Yes you can.”

She starts singing then, slow, soft, calm, and eventually Octavia’s breathing shudders into slow, shaky hiccups.

“Easy, strik gona. You’re not under the floor anymore. You’re here, you’re safe, you won. You’re a leader, Okteivia. You’re powerful.” 

The girl sleeps soon after, still curled into Niylah, one hand tangled in her shirt. The tear tracks on her face dry and glow silvery in the dark room, like stars. 

The next night, Niylah knocks on the door instead of pacing. Octavia opens it, grabs her hand, and yanks her in the door.

“You came back.”

“Of course I did. Why wouldn’t I?”

Octavia’s face is dark, shadowed, and Niylah’s heart breaks at the mist of tears forming in her eyes. 

“I-”

“It’s alright. It’s alright. Let’s go to bed.” 

Octavia clings to her the second they lay down, and Niylah presses her face to her hair, breathes in, and falls asleep.

It’s the best sleep she’s had since they entered the bunker.


	3. Let's Dance

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the unintentional long hiatus I got sucked into Orange is the New Black.

Niylah loves the lazy mornings they get. The bunker follows the same structure the Ark did, mostly for convenience, and they get a rest day once a week. On those days she and Octavia linger in the big bed, sometimes cuddling, sometimes fucking. This particular morning, Niylah wakes up first, earlier than usual.

Octavia is lovely in the mornings, her smooth, toned back exposed where the covers have rumpled around her waist with her movements. She was quiet through the night, no bad dreams or night terrors, and now, stretched out on the bed in the dim light, she looks like she’s been cut from marble. Niylah winds a lock of long, dark hair around her finger and tugs, gently. Octavia groans and pushes her face farther into the pillow she’s clutching. 

“No.”

“It’s rest day, ai niron.”

“Then let me rest.”

Octavia has shifted to her side, green eyes open but cloudy with sleep, and Niylah traces a finger between her breasts before kissing her nose. 

“You need a haircut, strik gona.”

Octavia purrs, almost catlike, as Niylah plays with the ends of her hair, slowly sliding down to face her on the bed. 

“Speak for yourself.”

A light chuckle. Octavia smiles and her eyes crinkle as a touch of pink shows in her cheeks. A year and a half in the bunker has leeched her skin of its golden tan, but the olive tone remains. Niylah wants to get out only to see Octavia under the sun again, glowing beneath the warm light. 

“What shall we do today?”

Octavia hums, her eyes closing.

“Hold me.” 

Niylah opens her arms and Octavia curls into them, her head just below Niylah’s chin. Absently, Niylah moves her hand to stroke at the puckered scar just above the back of Octavia’s pelvis from Echo’s blade. Octavia shivers. 

“Stop thinking, Niylah.”  
“I will not.” 

“I’m still here. I’m fine.”

“You almost weren’t. Many times. And then I never would have gotten this.”

Chapped lips drop a kiss to her collarbone, Octavia’s warm breath raising goosebumps on Niylah’s skin. 

“Wouldn’t that have been a tragedy.” 

Niylah hates her ability to make light of a situation and she tugs on Octavia’s long hair again playfully, to hide her fear of losing the girl in her arms.

“Ai hod yu in, Okteivia.” 

Another kiss. Octavia settles heavy against her, their bare skin sticking together.

“I love you too, beautiful.” 

~  
They finally drag themselves out of bed around lunchtime, and head to the mess hall, pressed together. The bunker is cold all the time, and Octavia, whose body temperature runs low, is almost always freezing, wrapped in sweaters or coats, thick socks, or, her favorite blanket, Niylah. 

There’s music playing in the mess hall, something sweet and soft. A man’s heavy voice sings out. Tables have been moved, and some of the younger couples are swaying to the music. 

“Let’s dance.”

Octavia peers up at her earnestly, looking strangely like the child Niylah forgets she is in the moment. It’s impossible to say no to her, not when her green eyes are clear and bright, not when she wants something. Niylah lets herself be pulled to the dance floor and loops her arms low on Octavia’s waist. 

“You’re so beautiful.” Low words murmured against Niylah’s neck. 

“A regular trophy wife.”

“Hush. I mean it.”

They sway. Octavia presses her mouth to Niylah’s jawline.   
“I don’t think I would have survived in here without you, Niylah.” 

“You would’ve. You’re stronger than you think.”

Octavia’s eyes are wet. Niylah kisses her on the mouth, warm and wet and heavy.

“I’m glad I don’t have to, though.”

Niylah laughs. It echos in the room, against the music. Octavia thinks her laugh sounds like bells ringing. 

“I’m glad too.”

So they sway to the music, wrapped in warmth and love and each other. 

Niylah loves lazy days.


	4. Don't Let Go

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> She doesn’t even think.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this is a two parter don't freak.
> 
> set season five timeline, everyone has been reunited

She doesn’t even think. They’re outnumbered three to one, the knife is flying straight toward Indra’s head, and Octavia slams into her without hesitation and lets the projectile bury itself in the hollow space beneath her collarbone. An arrow flies past her head, gunshots ring out, and she collapses to her knees, brings her hand up to the hilt of the knife, and yanks, every warning she’s ever heard about taking out things impaled in the body from Clarke flying out of her head. A rush of hot blood pours down her chest. Indra is moving towards her, seemingly in slow motion, fury lining her scarred face. Octavia falls backwards and someone catches her, cradling her to a warm, broad chest. She whimpers. The pain is eating at her from the inside out. Her vision blurs. 

“Stay with me, O.”

Bellamy. It’s Bellamy who’s holding her. Indra crouches in front of her, her face swirling. She looks angry, but the fear in her eyes is unmistakable and Octavia almost feels guilty for causing it until she remembers why she did it.

“You idiot child! What have you done?” 

“A-a thank you would be great.”

Indra rolls her eyes and brushes a piece of Octavia’s sweat soaked hair from her face, her eyes darting around the trees nervously. 

“She’s losing too much blood, and there could still be miners around. Bellamy, apply pressure, now.”

A large hand presses against the place where the pain originates and Octavia screeches and thrashes. Indra’s hand comes to hold her chin. 

“Be still, foolish girl.” 

“Indra, we need to get her back to the rover. There’s only so much I can do here and you’re right, we’re too exposed.”

“Get her up.” 

The movement makes her dizzy and she squeezes her eyes shut and lets out a whine. 

“N-Niylah.”

“She’s in the rover, O. We’re going to her right now.” 

She can tell they’re moving, the swaying of Bellamy’s steps is making her nauseated and she’s going to be sick. 

“Be-” She heaves. Her brother turns her head to her side and she gets sick on herself. Her shoulder wound throbs. 

“It’s ok, O.”

Indra’s hand grips at her own. 

“Breathe, Okteivia. You need to breathe.” 

“Niylah.”

“Soon, O.” 

She just wants her girlfriend. She wants her girlfriend to hold her and tell her she’s going to be alright, even though blood is leaving her body at an alarming rate. Her head spins and she cries out, tears leaking down her cheeks. All she can smell is her own blood, a terrible coppery scent that sticks to the back of her throat. 

“Niylah.” 

“I know. I know, Octavia.” 

She can hear shouts, and then there are other hands on her, Kane’s, smoothing her hair back. He’s asking questions too fast for her shocked brain to understand.

“N-Niylah.”

“I’m here, I’m here, I’m here. Right here, Okteivia, I’m right here.” 

She’s being held against a body she’s basically memorized and tension bleeds out of her in a rush and her eyes flutter closed. Her head aches, and she’s shivering. 

“No, nononononononono strik gona. Open your eyes. When I squeeze, I need you to squeeze back, alright? Can you do that for me?”

A hand squeezes hers, still Niylah. Someone is wiping vomit off of her shoulder, cutting through her shirt, pressing down on her wound too hard and she screams, more tears pouring from her eyes. Her hand goes limp.

“Okteivia, niron, come on, don’t let go. Keep squeezing.  
“C-can’t.”

“You can, strik gona. Don’t let go. Please, Okteivia. Don’t let go.”

“I-I love you.”

“I know, Okteivia, I love you so much sweetheart please just stay awake for me.”

She can’t really see anymore, and sounds are starting to blur together into a discordant hum. She lets her hand go limp again, and her eyes flutter closed.

“Okteivia-”

“Kane, there’s too much blood-”

“Drive faster, Bellamy, she’s barely breathing-”

“Stay with us, O-”

“Niron, come on, open your-”

“Octavia, please-”

Her body goes still, and her brain short circuits. 

Everything goes dark.


	5. Don't Worry, I'm Here

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Pt. 2 of chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: I wrote this with a hangover so like if it sucks don't @ me

In her dream, she’s up to her elbows in Octavia’s blood. They’re in a forest, one Niylah doesn’t recognize, and there’s screams coming from all around them, but she can’t see any people, just shadows. Octavia can barely breathe, and her entire body is trembling with pain and fear. Niylah tries to say something to her, to comfort her, but she can’t speak. The screams get closer to them, and Octavia convulses violently and then goes still.

She has no heartbeat. The screams get closer and closer and Niylah realizes she’s the one screaming. Octavia is dead, and the shadows are closing in and-

She wakes up with her head on Octavia’s cot in a cold sweat, her entire body trembling. Bellamy is sitting opposite her, rubbing his thumb across the back of Octavia’s hand absently. 

“You ok?”

Niylah nods, but she’s still shaking and she feels like she may be sick. She reaches up to stroke Octavia’s cheek, pushing some of her sweat damp hair back. Octavia is running a fever, Abby thinks from trauma, and her breathing is slow and labored. They have no IV lines, no blood transfusions, and Octavia is dehydrated and hypovolemic. Her body is exhausted. Niylah is exhausted. She chokes on a dry sob and presses a hand to her mouth.

“Niylah. What happened?”

“It was just a dream.”

Bellamy eyes her carefully. Niylah refuses to meet his eyes and instead takes Octavia in slowly. Her chest and shoulder are bandaged heavily, her arm in a sling. She’s so pale she’s nearly gray, even in the dim light of the makeshift medical bay. She hears Bellamy’s chair scrape back, and then there’s a large hand resting on her shoulder. She leans into it, needing the comfort. 

“You and Abby and Clarke got her patched up. She’s stable. She’s going to be fine, Niylah.”

“It’s hard to work on someone you love. I was so worried the entire time that I was going to do something wrong and I was going to lose her. I can’t lose her.” 

Bellamy sits heavily on the edge of his sister’s cot, rubbing a hand over the shape of her leg beneath the blanket when Octavia shifts in her sleep in response. 

“When Octavia was 10, she got the flu. She had no immunity to it, and her fever was so high she was hallucinating. I was so terrified she was going to die that I didn’t let her out of my sight until her fever broke. She was fine. Bounced back in a week after the fever finally broke. She’s going to be fine this time too. She’s such a fighter.”

Bellamy’s voice cracks on the last word and Niylah reaches for his hand. They sit there, in silence, and pray to whatever exists that Octavia can keep fighting this time. 

~

Octavia wakes up the next day. Niylah is wiping her face with a wet cloth and fussing with her hair when she hears a tiny whimper from the bed and then Octavia’s eyes are open and she’s gasping in agony, trying to twist to protect her shoulder on instinct.

“Okteivia. Okteivia. You’re ok, you’re ok. ABBY!”

Octavia cries out audibly then, her eyelids fluttering shut as she pales. Niylah takes her hand and squeezes, hard. Abby comes running, her face creased with worry. 

“Octavia, honey, you’re alright. I’m here.”

“Abby, she needs something for the pain.” 

“I know, I know, we don’t have any- Octavia, sweetheart, you need to breathe.”

Octavia is hyperventilating in the bed, trying and failing to escape the pain. She coughs, chokes, and then gags hard and Abby sits her up just before she vomits bile. 

“Easy sweet girl. Easy.” 

Octavia’s eyes roll back in her head and she slumps against Abby’s bracing arm. Niylah slides onto the bed behind her and takes her weight, stroking her girlfriend’s forehead and putting a firm hand against Octavia’s racing heart. 

“Breathe, Okteivia. Breathe.” 

It takes time, but Niylah manages to coax Octavia’s breathing back down to a steady rate. Her girlfriend relaxes into her, pillowing her heavy head in the crook of Niylah’s neck. 

“S-sorry.”

“For what, ai niron?”

“Gettin’ hurt.”

“You did it to save Indra. I’m not angry with you.”

Octavia whines low and shifts and Niylah strokes her hair till the wave of pain passes, pressing delicate kisses to Octavia’s face. 

“Is Indra angry?”

“What? No! Okteivia, she’s just worried. We’re all worried.”

“ ‘M ok. It’s ok.”

Niylah snuggles down with Octavia still resting against her chest. Octavia shudders with exhaustion. 

“Sleep, ai niron. 

“But-”

“But what?”

“You’re gonna leave.”

“Don’t worry. I’m here. I’m here and I’ll be here when you wake up.”

“Love you.”

“I love you too, sweet one.”


	6. Don't Be Scared

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Octavia has a nightmare. Niylah comforts her.

There’s a gun to Niylah’s head. She’s on her knees, bloody, bruised, beaten to a point of near death. Octavia stands, frozen. Her wrists are chained and she doesn’t recognize the room where she is at first, looking around desperately. It’s the airlock on the Ark, the one she watched her mother get sucked out of nearly 8 years ago. She tries to scream but she can’t, because someone has cut out her tongue. Her mouth fills with the taste of blood and she chokes on it. The doors to the airlock begin to close and the light glows red around her. The man with the gun to Niylah’s head, it’s Pike, Octavia realizes with nauseating clarity, squeezes the trigger. 

There’s not enough air left in her lungs to scream when Niylah hits the ground. Her body changes, flickering between Niylah’s lean, pale body and Lincoln, sprawled in the mud in a growing pool of blood. Pike laughs and speaks to her in Luna’s voice. 

“Lincoln would be ashamed of you.” 

Octavia feels her heart slow. Her body jolts once, twice, gasping for air and then-

“NO!” 

She sits up so fast she collapses back down, her head spinning and her vision going black around the edges. The room is too dark, every shadow out to get her, and her stomach revolts before she can get herself under control. Octavia rolls to the side and gags up yellow bile. She’d skipped dinner, rations were few and far between and someone needed it more than her, someone always needed it more than her. The smell of her stomach acid makes her dry heave. 

The bed is cold, and Octavia is cold, soaking in a thin layer of icy sweat. Her hand trembles when she goes to wipe her mouth. Niylah is on night shift this week, and the nightmares that ease when Niylah is in the bed with her are back full force for the first time in 6 years. Niylah has been able to avoid nights, but with rations low and oxygen levels down dangerously, Medbay is all hands on deck. Octavia shivers, and presses a hand to her temple. She needs her girlfriend. Her heart is beating too fast in her chest. She gags again. She needs to see Niylah. Now.

She stumbles from the bed. She’s only wearing a bra and a pair of boxers, and it’s all she can do to slip a pair of socks on and wrap herself in one of the blankets on the bed before she’s staggering to the door of her room and throwing it open so hard it slams against the wall of the hallway. She can barely keep her balance, her heart is racing so hard. Her extremeties are going numb. She’s having a panic attack, and she can’t stop it. Medbay seems impossibly far away. 

“Octavia?”

The door to the room across from her opens, and Kane steps into the hallway, immediately bracing Octavia’s swaying body.

“You’re alright. Are you sick?”

Octavia can hear herself breathing.

“I-I...need, um, I need-”

“Take it easy.”

“N-Niylah.”

Kane nods in understanding, pressing one of Octavia’s clenched fists to his chest. His heartbeat is regular, steady, and she tries to focus on that instead of the overwhelming terror surrounding her.

“We’ll walk to medbay together, alright? Do you need help?”

She shakes her head no, takes two staggering steps, and then her knees give under her and Kane catches her.

“I got you. I got you.”

She lets her head fall to his shoulder. She’s hyperventilating so badly that her muscles are seizing from an overload of carbon dioxide.

“Do you want to talk about it?”

“N-no. I ju-just want Niylah.”

“Ok. We’ll go to her.”

Medbay is crowded, even this late at night. Niylah is hovering over the bed of a four year old boy, who was coughing pitifully in his cot. Abby sees them first and is there in seconds.

“Is she okay? Octavia, sweetheart, what happened?”

“P-panic attack. I w-want Niylah.”

“Ok, love. Ok. I’ll get her, and she can take you home. Does that sound good?”

Octavia nods. Her legs are shaking. Niylah is heading towards her, slipping her arms around her and taking her weight from Kane. They’re out the door before Octavia can blink. 

“Ni-Niylah.”

“Shhhh, ai niron. Don’t be scared. I’m here.”

“I d-dreamed you were dead. And-and then you weren’t in the bed and-”

“It’s alright. I’m here now.”

The door to the bedroom swings open and Niylah wrinkles her nose.

“You vomited?”

Octavia nods. Niylah’s warmth has calmed her down and now she’s just heavy and languid against her girlfriend’s side.

“It’s alright. I’ll clean it up, you lay down.”

Octavia trembles in response

Niylah cleans the floor quickly and then lays down next to Octavia, curling around her body and cradling her. Octavia presses her face into Niylah’s chest and whimpers weakly. She’s exhausted.

“Strik gona. I’m here. I’m not going anywhere. I’m alive and well.”

“P-promise?”

“I swear to you, Okteivia.”

Octavia nods shakily. Niylah’s grip tightens on her and Octavia shivers when her nails begin to travel up and down her spine.

“Niylah?”

“Mm?”

“I love you.”

“I love you too, ai niron. So, so much.”


	7. You're Warm

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This may be a two parter bc I have a lot of sick day niytavia head canons

The fever comes on in the middle of the night. Octavia wakes up shivering and sick to her stomach. Her head is throbbing, her throat is raw, and when she reaches up to press a hand to her aching temple, it comes away slick with a cold sweat. She whimpers. A cough bursts from her chest harshly. She tries to stifle it, pressing her face into her pillow, but she wakes Niylah up anyways. 

“Okteivia?”

Niylah’s hand comes to rest on her back as she coughs. A clump of something sticky lodges itself on Octavia’s tongue. 

“Shhh, shhh, shhhh. It’s alright, love.” 

She flops onto her back, gasping for air. Niylah pushes her hair back gently. 

“I don’t feel good.”

“You’re too warm, sweetheart. I can imagine you’re feeling pretty terrible.”

“My-” 

And then she’s up, and sprinting towards the bathroom with her head swimming and her legs shaking. She barely makes it to the toilet before she’s throwing up what little is still in her stomach from the day before. It’s mostly bile, with a smattering of the crackers she’d eaten right before she went to sleep, and most importantly, it burns her already aching throat something awful. She’s still gagging into the toilet when Niylah’s deft fingers gather her dark hair back. She hears a soft groan from behind her, and that’s when she realizes she must have puked in her hair. 

“S-sorry.”

She goes back to puking after that. Niylah just rubs her back with her free hand, cooing to her in Trigedasleng. When it finally stops, Octavia’s abs ache and her head throbs even harder. She falls back into Niylah, slumping against her girlfriend’s chest. 

“Strik gona, would you like a shower?”

Octavia shakes her head, then remembers that there’s vomit in her hair and croaks out a weak moan that she hopes her girlfriend knows means yes. 

The water is cold, and if Octavia had the energy she would bitch about it, but she doesn’t, she just lets Niylah wash her aching skin gently and scrub her hair. She’s near boneless by the time the water shuts off.   
“Let’s go back to bed, hmm?” 

Octavia nods. She lets Niylah help her into fresh clothes and between the sheets of their bed. There’s a damp patch where her body was before she woke up, from the fever sweat that’s already forming a new sticky sheen on her skin. 

“Sleep, ai niron. We’ll go see Abby in the morning.”

~  
She wakes up freezing again, curling instantly closer to where Niylah should be and coming up with nothing but empty space.

“Time to get up, Okteivia.”

“Mmmmm. No. Come back to bed.”

“We’ve got to see Abby, love.”

“No. You’re warm. Come back to bed.” 

Her stomach flips. Violently.

She throws up in the bed before she can open her eyes. 

“That’s it. We’re going to see Abby now.” 

~

She ends up having the flu that’s been making the rounds in the bunker. Abby sends her home with electrolyte powder, a thermometer, and something for her fever. 

“You’ll be fine in a couple days, honey.”

She buries her face into Niylah’s shoulder, the light hurting her eyes. Abby reaches up and rubs a hand over her hair. 

“Niylah, take the week. Keep an eye on her. If her fever gets above 103, bring her back. If she can’t keep the electrolyte drink down consistently, bring her back. Give her those-”

Octavia leans forward and throws up on the medbay floor. 

“Oh, honey.”

“Abby, this is the third time she’s vomited today.”

There’s a prick in her upper arm. She’s falling asleep. 

“O-ow.” 

“Shhhh. It’s for the nausea, sweetie.” 

She’s not entirely sure how she ends up back in her bed. She thinks she walks there, with Niylah’s help and something draped over her eyes, but she doesn’t know. 

“Sleep, okay?”

“Mmmmm”

Niylah lays down next to her and Octavia curls into her with a whimper.

“Love you.”

“I know, Okteivia. I love you too. Sleep, baby. I’ll be here when you wake up.”

“Promise?”

“Forever.”


	8. Hot Water

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm not dead.

Niylah has never seen Octavia’s eyes look so empty. 

The past 46 days they’ve grown closer, their relationship shifting into something neither wants to name yet, a flower on the verge of opening. Today, Niylah’s chest aches as she thinks about it. Their reality is altered permanently now, for better or for worse. 

Octavia sits, small and pale and quiet, on the edge of the toilet in her quarters, stripped bare in front of her, sticky with drying blood and fluids. The scar from Echo’s blade is still raw, red and angry and mottled. Niylah knows it still hurts her to move in certain ways, but only from observation. Octavia does not admit such weaknesses willingly. Niylah kneels, body language purposefully submissive, and takes Octavia’s chin in her hands. The girl flinches, a cornered animal ready to strike, and Niylah holds her face more firmly, still avoiding eye contact. 

“Look at me, Okteivia.” 

She does, tears glossing her green eyes. Niylah lets out a breath at the willing eye contact, straightening her back and taking charge. The damp washcloth perched on the edge of the sink will not be enough to clean the blood from Octavia’s skin, but they’ll start there. 

Octavia lets out a high, startled whine when Niylah presses the cloth to her cheek, wiping in soothing motions, and then begins to shake uncontrollably, one hand landing on Niylah’s thigh and fisting the fabric of her pants in an effort to ground herself. Niylah hums, soothingly, brushing the damp cloth over the bridge of Octavia’s nose. She’s coming back into herself, from the look and feel of it, her body language shifting. 

“Are you in there, love?”

Octavia nods, blinking. Niylah coos, wiping between her fingers. The cloth is rust red and beginning to cool rapidly, and Octavia jerks away from it. 

“Can I- I want a shower.” 

“Alright. I’ll be out there until you’re finished. Would you like some clothes?”

She goes to get up, but Octavia’s hand shoots out and curls around her wrist, blunt nails digging in over her pulse point in her urgency.

“Please don’t- Don’t leave me.” 

Niylah settles on the floor, letting Octavia get in the shower. The bathroom fills with steam, making her sleepy. 

She’ll stay as long as Octavia wants.


	9. Cliffside

On their sixth day in Eden, Octavia begins to wake, slowly. It starts with a twitch in her fingers, a slight tremor through her limbs. By nightfall she’s increasingly restless, moaning and thrashing. Her muscles spasm under Niylah’s palms and she whines when they do, face scrunching in pain. She’s been scratching at herself in her sleep since she was attacked, nails jagged and sharp and leaving bloody gouge marks in her pale skin when they don’t watch her closely enough. Indra spends nights on the edge of her mattress, face drawn, both of Octavia’s hands clasped in her own. She talks to her in low tones, exclusively in Trigedasleng. Niylah tries not to listen in when she can help it. Those are words meant for mother and daughter only. For the first time Niylah begins to notice the wrinkles gathering at the corners of Indra’s eyes, the way her fingers have begun to swell with the morning dew. The room Diyoza sent Octavia to is filled with other members of what used to be Wonkru and is now a nebulous concept of loyalty, fear, and survival. Close friends. Allies. Advisors. Miller and Jackson, Gaia. Indra, always. She has to be forced to leave Octavia’s side. 

Niylah wants to hit Bellamy Blake more than she ever has in her life, and that includes the time he showed up at her home after committing a massacre that killed her family and friends. He tries to speak with her one night, at the long makeshift tables set up in the center of the little town, and she walks away without a word. Clarke’s little nightblood, Madi, shoots her worried, secretive looks whenever Niylah emerges from the room. Niylah ignores those as well. Better not to cross Clarke. They’ve all seen what happens when you do. 

When Octavia’s eyes finally open, they’re cloudy, almost unseeing. It’s midday and the sun is warm where it falls across dusty hardwood. A beam of it strokes across Octavia’s cheek when she turns her head with a wheezy gasp, her tongue clicking against her teeth. 

“Lincoln?”

Niylah feels her heart drop and shatter. She reaches out, brushing strands of limp hair from the sweaty pallor of Octavia’s skin. She’s almost gaunt, a week and a half of unconsciousness making weight she doesn’t have fall right off her. There’s a cup of water and Niylah picks it up, dips her finger in, and wets Octavia’s cracking lips. 

“I’m sorry, my love. Just me.”

Octavia blinks and shudders, jolting violently into her own body and into the present.

“I had- he was-”

She’s disoriented, confused, grasping at Niylah fearfully, trying to sit up, to get her legs underneath her. Niylah calls for Indra loudly, hoping her voice carries out the open window and finds her, wherever she is. 

“Hush. Lay still.”  
“I have to- I have to-”

And as Niylah’s stomach twists into knots, Octavia begins to cry. Big, violent sobs that stick in her chest and stomach and throat, pressing her face into the pillow and wrenching herself from Niylah’s grip as she cries. Niylah reaches for her but Octavia slaps her hand away with another sob. Indra storms in, brushing past Niylah as she stands up and crouching next to Octavia. Niylah ignores the fact that Octavia lets Indra touch her, lets Indra lift her upper body into her arms and rock her as she cries and cries. 

She walks from the house, past the mess tables, and into the woods. 

Niylah looks out over Eden, standing on the edge of the cliff face overlooking the valley, and she cries.


	10. Sandstorms

“I’m coming with you.”

Octavia moans, rubs at her sore head. Niylah is binding her ribs gently, an even pressure dulling some of the pain from being thrown violently back onto cobblestone had produced. She just wants to sleep. 

“You are not.”

“I am. I leave you alone for two seconds and you nearly get blown up, do you honestly think I’m going to let you cross a desert without me? Done. Deep breath?”

Octavia takes one. 

“Good girl.” 

“Don’t start something you won’t finish, Niylah.”

Niylah shoves her, and Octavia topples back onto the pillows of the massive bed willingly, pouting.

“I’m not having sex with you. You cracked a rib. Are you stupid?”

“Yes.”

Niylah snuggles up to her, tucking Octavia’s head under her chin and pressing a barely there kiss to the crown of her head. 

“You’re not coming, Niylah.”

“Fucking stop me, Blodreina.” 

“Niylah, please, ok, just-”

“Just what?”

“It’s too dangerous.” 

“That’s exactly why I’m coming with you.” 

Niylah brushes smooth strokes up and down Octavia’s bare back, hand catching on the rough gauze of the bandages. The room is dark, and cool, and she’s so tired. 

“Fine. You can come. But if there’s trouble you get as far away as you can, alright?”  
Niylah nods. Octavia settles farther against her, pressing an ear to her chest and letting her heartbeat thrum in her skull. 

“I can’t lose you.” 

“You won’t.” 

~

In the dark of the desert, Octavia screams and thrashes against Clarke and her brother’s hands, and Niylah has never been so terrified in her life. The tent is lit up and Indra grabs her, tugging her away from Octavia’s body as tremors shoot through it.

“No! I’m staying with her.”

“She’d want you away from danger.”

“Like hell.” 

Indra doesn’t fight her too hard, because Bellamy is up and moving, dragging Octavia’s limp body into the nearest tent, flanked by Clarke. She senses Cooper to her left, Indra to her right, and doesn’t feel at all guilty when she slides in front of Bellamy and takes Octavia’s face in her hands. Nobody knows about them who wasn’t inside the bunker. Octavia has been reticent about it, too scared that someone will use Niylah against her, but Niylah doesn’t care because Octavia is moaning, terrified, half paralysed, reaching for her with the hand her brother isn’t pinning to the table. Indra grips her shoulders. 

“I’m here, my love. I’m here, I’m right here.” 

Octavia lets out a noise that makes Niylah’s stomach clench. Clarke is shouting, and Indra whips a knife out of her belt and hands it over Octavia’s head. 

“Don’t look, baby. Look at me, focus on me.” 

Octavia howls. Niylah looks over to see Clarke’s fingers in her arm up to the knuckle. 

“Ssssshhhh. Clarke, hurry, she’s about to pass out.”

Because she is. She’s swaying against Indra’s hands, her eyes rolling in her skull. Niylah pinches her chin harshly. 

“No, don’t you dare pass out on me, Octavia Blake.”

Indra’s fingers dig into Octavia’s shoulders hard, and then the creature is out and Octavia slumps forwards, standing up. Niylah grabs her around the ribs before she can collapse. 

“Get ready to understand.” 

Octavia goes limp as they run from the tents, dragging Indra and Niylah into the sand with her. She’s still conscious, barely, her head rolling across her brother’s shoulder. She moans, hands clutching at nothing. 

Once they’re in the sandstorm, Niylah hits her knees and props Octavia up against her chest. She holds her, stroking the fever sweat from her forehead as the venom takes hold of her body. The tremors make her cry out, her muscles seizing and rippling. She’s in pain, burning with fever, and Niylah can’t fix it and it’s breaking her. She rocks her as Clarke wets a rag and dabs at Octavia’s forehead. 

“Sshhhhhh. Shhhh.” 

“Mmmmmmmm”

It lasts too long. Octavia begins to come out of her stupor as it passes and everyone breaks formation, collapsing around them like an avalanche. 

“N-Niylah.” 

She kisses Octavia, just barely, a tease of lips, and helps her to the swell of a sand dune. 

Octavia sleeps most of the way back to the bunker, her head buried in Niylah’s lap as the rover bumps over the sand. Bellamy keeps looking at them like he wants to ask questions. But he doesn’t. 

Good. 

Once they get back to Polis and Clarke shepherds Octavia into the bunker to check her arm, Niylah finds herself cornered. 

“What are you to my sister?”

Bellamy doesn’t look angry, just intense. Niylah has been sleeping with a Blake for the better part of 6 years. Intense doesn’t phase her. 

“I love her. She loves me. That’s what’s important.” 

“If you hurt her-”  
“I think what’s more important is what will happen to you if you hurt her. You’ve been gone a long time, Bellamy.” 

She leaves him like that, staring open mouthed at her, and goes to her and Octavia’s bedroom. She needs a nap. 

~

Days later, curled up on her side next to Octavia’s still form, listening to her choking breaths and the erratic beeps of the heart monitor, Niylah thinks back to her threat against the older Blake and decides not to act on it. 

The guilt will torture him enough.


	11. Blood, Floor, Wonder

Indra is the one that finds her. 

Three years into their imprisonment, and Octavia still has enemies. They’re quiet, hidden away, and no one has made a move on her in almost two years. They let their guard down and they get sloppy. 

Niylah is on shift in medbay when they bring her in, Blodreina cradled in Miller’s arms and flanked by Kara and Indra. She’s doing inventory, quietly humming to herself and listening to music on the little player Octavia had given her one day, a shy smile on her lips when she’d presented the gift, so different than the Iron Queen the people had come to know her as. It takes a while for her to snap from her daze and notice the shouts from the main ward. 

“No, no!”

Octavia is limp, drenched in blood, her clothes torn. She’s still semi conscious, her green eyes shifting and rolling in the sockets. Niylah can see a patch on her scalp where her hair has been ripped out, bloody and raw. She drops her little player, her knees threatening to give out. She staggers towards the cot Miller places Octavia on, dropping to her knees, hands fluttering over the bloody shreds of her skin. 

“What happened. What happened-”

“Niylah. Scrub up before you touch her!”

Abby emerges from the office in the back corner of the medical ward, already snapping gloves on and grabbing up IV bags. Niylah sobs but scrubs herself up to the elbows and grabs the shears to cut the remnants of Octavia’s top off. 

“Her blood pressure is low and getting lower and her pulse is unstable and erratic, start two IV lines. I need a vitals monitor on her finger right now. Niylah, what’s the damage?”

“Extensive.”

Indra is stiff, gripping Octavia’s face with two blood hands. Octavia moans, her back arching suddenly and her heartbeat spiking through the roof. Abby swears. 

“Prep for surgery. Now.” 

~

“I found her near the training chambers. She wasn’t coherent, not enough to tell me what happened. I radioed for Miller and brought her straight here.”

Indra sits, tense and visibly exhausted, in a chair by Octavia’s bed. She’s stable, oxygen coming in through a cannula in her nose. A wound from the knife damaged a lung. She hasn’t woken up yet, but Abby is confident she will soon. Niylah lays on her side next to Octavia, stroking her hair back from her face delicately. 

“This wasn’t calculated. Whoever attacked her wasn’t trained to fight, and didn’t know how to kill.”

“A crime of passion, then.”

Abby nods. Octavia shifts in her sleep and then settles. 

She wakes up halfway through the night, smiling with cracked lips when she sees Indra slumped in the chair against her cot. Niylah is awake, wiping the sheen of sweat off her face. She’s got a fever, hopefully from trauma and not infection. 

“Hi, sweet one.”

Octavia shifts, her face scrunching. 

“Mmm. Has she been here all night?”

“Yes. You scared us.”

“Life was getting boring. What can I say.”

Niylah grins, rubbing a thumb across Octavia’s cheek. 

“Next time, just tell me to tie you up in bed or something, alright?”

“Deal.”


	12. Closets

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sex, but tastefully graphic

Niylah gets about half a scream out as someone grabs her by the arm and hauls her into a closet before there’s lips against hers and Octavia’s hand cupping her ass. She breaks the kiss, wrapping an arm around Octavia’s narrow waist, fingers finding the scar above her iliac crest like always. She rests her forehead against Octavia’s and looks at her cross eyed, brushing the barest slip of skin on her back. Octavia shivers and melts against her. Niylah kisses her, a tiny hint of tongue. A tease. 

“You know we have a bed and a bedroom for this, right?”

Octavia moans, peppering kisses down her neck, nipping at her collarbone. The hand on her ass begins to slide and move down around her thigh, Octavia’s fingers squeezing. 

“No time. Meeting in 10.”

Deft fingers pop the button on the front of Niylah’s jeans and Octavia’s hand slides down into her underwear, probing at her wet heat. She sighs, letting her head loll back onto Octavia’s shoulder as they slide to the floor. 

“So wet, baby.”

“I’d be wetter if you had given me warning- fuck.”

Octavia presses the pad of her thumb down onto Niylah’s sensitive clit and swipes down with just enough pressure to make her hips roll. 

“I think you’re pretty good, hm?”

“You’re a terrible person.” 

Octavia bites down on her shoulder as she introduces a finger and Niylah can feel the evil smirk curving around her skin. She bucks, coaxing Octavia into a faster rhythm. They have limited time, after all, and Niylah is well committed at this point. 

“Terrible. Absolutely.” 

“Horrible, Blodreina.”

Octavia’s thighs shake and then clench together under Niylah’s ass. Octavia doesn’t have a power trip, but she definitely does in the bedroom. Good. 

“Add another finger, O, fuck.”

She does. Niylah rolls her hips slow and controlled, making sure to grind back against Octavia when she does. O whimpers, her hand moving faster. 

When Niylah cums, she licks it off Octavia’s fingers just to watch O’s eyes roll back in their sockets. Octavia shivers, full bodied, and goes to shuck her pants off. Niylah stops her.

“You have a meeting in two minutes, Blodreina.”

“Now who’s the terrible person?”

“I’ll make it up to you.”

Niylah makes sure to squeeze O’s ass a little tighter when they leave.


	13. New Beginnings

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> a 125 year old flu

Her head feels fuzzy, her body cold and trembling. She sucks air through her teeth, pain shooting through her abused muscles. The last thing she can remember is- nothing. Just her brother’s face, a vague emotional ache in her chest, the feeling of her eyelids sliding shut, and something cool fanning over her clean skin. 

Whatever she’s laying on begins to move. Her body, stiff and still half in sleep, jolts uncomfortably and Octavia’s stomach rolls. She whimpers, wincing when the sound tears at her dry throat.

Either she’s sick, or she’s been asleep for a very long time. 

A hand smooths over her skin, the fingers thin and calloused on the tips. Octavia groans again, tries to draw herself out of the sticky haze clouding her head, and fails. Her stomach and lungs hurt.

“Okteivia.”

Niylah’s soft lilt filters through the fog over her brain, but it’s not enough to bring her around. She doesn’t feel good. She feels sick and achy and miserable, actually. 

“Oh, niron. Baby girl. You feel sick?”

All she can do is force herself to nod, as she realizes that she is, in fact, sick. Niylah helps her to sitting, stabilizing her when she sways. She’s still in the white tank top and shorts, memories of changing into them coming back to her every time her head throbs. She peels her eyes open, focuses on Niylah’s hazel eyes and her soft hair falling in her face. She hasn’t seen her in ten years, hasn’t kissed her in ten years. She leans into her chest.

“Clarke? Yeah, can you come look over O?”

She flinches away from Clarke, jerking into Niylah’s arms. She doesn’t want it. She wants to be left to her girlfriend, left to suffer quietly, but Clarke reaches out and palms her cheek, pressing the back of her hand against Octavia’s forehead. 

“Well, she definitely has a fever. I want to say it could be from the cryo pod, but nobody else woke up with one, so it’s very possible she was coming down with something before we entered stasis and that waking her up triggered it.”

“So she has a 125 year old case of the flu.”

“Yep.”

Octavia groans again. The table is not comfortable, she’s achy and she feels like hot shit, and- wait. How many years?

“125 years?”

“Yeah, O.”

Octavia shoves her face into Niylah’s breast, digs her fingers into Niylah’s shirt, and whimpers. There are tears collecting in her eyes from the pain in her head and the nausea in her stomach, and she cannot wrap her head around the whole “she’s been asleep for 125 years” bullshit.

“We’ll get some fluids in her, some fever reducer if we have any, and she should feel better within a few days.” 

Octavia grumbles, swallows, breathes in sharply through her nose, and then spits up stomach acid onto her shiny new tanktop.

“Maybe some anti nausea, then, too.”

The medbay on the ship is too sterile, and she clings to Niylah desperately, fear and illness waging war in her broken brain as Clarke sets her up on a fluid drip and gives her a shot in the thigh. 

“There’s a new planet.”

Her head rolls across the pillow, focusing in on Niylah’s face next to hers. Niylah brushes some of her hair back from her sweaty forehead. 

“Yeah?”

Her throat cracks on the word. Her head is throbbing behind her eyes. Niylah kisses her temple. 

“Yeah. Don’t have details, yet. Was a bit too busy letting you throw up on me.”

She rolls her eyes, then lets them fall shut.

“A new beginning.”

Niylah curls her arms around Octavia’s torso, letting her settle into the warmth. 

“Yes. Just for us, my love.”


	14. The Dark Year

Niylah never knew Lincoln.

He was older than her, lived in a different village. At Trikru gatherings she would see him in passing or in the distance and her friends would cluster and giggle and stare. Niylah, being what she was, remained uninterested. Yes, he was tall and broad and just the right amount of brooding.

When her friends stared and flirted, Niylah disappeared into the dark, hand in hand with whatever lovely girl she found that time around.

She never knew Lincoln, but she’s learning more and more about him from Octavia’s screams.

Her girlfriend is huddled in the shower, warm water streaming down onto her limp, soaked hair. It gathers in clumps on Octavia’s back and shoulders, so long it nearly brushes the waistband of her jeans. Niylah hums mindlessly, scared to turn her back as she strips herself down as well and slides into the tub. Octavia shakes and burrows into Niylah, whimpering.

“Shush. Just a dream, Okteivia.”

“He hates me.”

“He’s not real, sweetheart.”

Octavia’s damp hand comes between them to rest on the swell of Niylah’s bare left breast, just over her heart. Her nails are bitten and bloody, the skin around them in the same state. The stress.

“He was real. He was.”

“I know, Okteivia.”

She peppers kisses to the top of Octavia’s head, reaching around her shivering body for the shampoo. Octavia had woken shrieking, and thrown up, begging something Niylah couldn’t see for forgiveness.

“I had to eat it. We have to. We’ll die without it.”

Niylah shudders and tries not to think of dinner.

The protein crops are rebounding, but they’re still not enough. They’re still- no. She begins to wash Octavia’s hair, scratching at her scalp the way she likes. There’s reddish vomit clinging to some of the strands that lay near her face, and Niylah pays extra attention to that spot, as though scrubbing Octavia clean can scrub the whole mess clean.

“Luna was right.”

“Hmm?”

Niylah washes Octavia’s back and arms with sweet soap, inhaling the scent of florals and herbs on Octavia’s scarred shoulderblade.

“He would be disappointed in me.”

“The dead are gone, Okteivia. The living are hungry. And you’re doing what must be done.”

Niylah wipes the tears from Octavia’s cheeks with soap, the fear from her body with warm water.

Their reality is slowly breaking them all.


	15. No Boots On The Bed

“No boots on the bed.”

Octavia just grumbles, her face pressed into the mountain of pillows littering the comforter she’s splayed on top of, boots still firmly laced and sword still sheathed at her side. Niylah would be willing to bet she still has her makeup on, as well. So much for the clean sheets. She sighs, smacking Octavia playfully on the ass.

“No fucking swords on the bed either, ai niron.”

Octavia groans, kicking blindly at the space she must think Niylah is standing in haphazardly. Niylah takes the opportunity to grab her ankle, unlacing the boot and tugging it off. Octavia whines like a child, tucking her other foot underneath her.

“Lemme sleeeeeep.”

“Why do you want to sleep with your boots on?”

A jerky, irritated shrug. Niylah yanks up Octavia’s other foot and slides her boot off.

“Sword.”

“You’re sleeping on the couch.”

“You can’t banish me, this is my bed too. Now, give me your sword.”

Octavia sits up to take off her sword belt and Niylah sees just how exhausted she looks. There are deep circles under her eyes, her hair is a mess, her cheeks are pale, and her makeup is smeared all over her face.

And the pillows.

Niylah rolls her eyes, and pounces, dragging Octavia down and pinning her to the mattress, her weight settled in the crook of Octavia’s narrow hips.

“You’ve made a mess.”

“Care to make it worse?”

Niylah grins, sharp and predatory.

“If you don’t make me sleep on the couch.”


	16. Nightmares

She’s never seen Octavia so still.

Bellamy has left, and so has Indra. Miller is pacing by the door, chewing his nails. She checks the monitors, and then checks them again.

“Niylah.”

“Mm.”

Jackson stills her hand as she reaches to adjust Octavia’s oxygen tubes for the third time in as many minutes. She flinches at the touch, on edge, exhausted.

“When’s the last time you slept?”

She can’t remember. Octavia wheezes, in and out. A monitor beeps in alarm. She’s reading and reacting before she can think about it, adjusting the flow of Octavia’s O2 and watching her sats closely until they hit a suitable level. Her breathing gets easier. Niylah sighs, scrubs a hand over her face, and goes back to wiping fever sweat from her damp skin. Octavia looks gray under the lights, the sickly green glow from the heart rate monitor and the dialysis machine making her look dead already, instead of on her way there.

“Niylah, that’s enough.”

“It isn’t.”

Jackson wraps a hand around hers, and tugs the damp cloth from her fingers. Niylah lets out a dry sob.

“Rest. You need it.”

“I won’t leave her.”

“I won’t make you. Just, lay down or something. Mind the tubes.”

She curls along Octavia’s side, tugging her head into her lap and brushing through her hair with rhythmic strokes. Miller comes and sits heavily in a chair next to the heart monitor display, patting the one next to it. It’s quiet, calm, still.

Octavia’s breathing deteriorates through the night. They take shifts, between the three of them, to monitor her vitals and keep watch over the door. At some point, while Niylah dozes, still with Octavia’s head in her lap, Indra joins their small vigil.

“I posted new guards outside the door. Fresh ones.”

Octavia coughs, low and deep. Her breath sounds like someone is scraping at the walls of her lungs.

“Shhh. shh.”

“Her oxygen dropped again. She’s on 100% through the cannula.”

Niylah sighs. Octavia is too warm, warmer than she was before.

“Jackson, take her temperature again.”

And so it goes. They end up intubating her at about 4 in the morning, something that never fails to make Niylah’s stomach churn faintly. It helps slightly. Within an hour her temperature is lower and her heartbeat is a little steadier. Small victories.

“Come on, ai niron,” Niylah murmurs, pressing her forehead to Octavia’s. Her chest rises and falls mechanically with the pump of the ventilator, her skin slick with sweat.

“Come back to me.”


End file.
